tour
/tɔː(ɹ)/
"tour" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“tour” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #1,112 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #1,112
- frequency rank, English
- 4
- letters
- 5
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A journey through a particular building, estate, country, etc.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | tour |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /tɔː(ɹ)/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #1,112 |
| Misspellings tracked | 5 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “tour” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for tour is 4 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /tɔː(ɹ)/. Corpus data places it at rank #1,112 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 11 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 5 likely wrong-spelling variants for tour, with forms such as "otur", "toru", and "tourr". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "Tu", "toy", "tub", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Old French tour, tourn, from the verb torner, tourner. The correct English form is tour, spelled T-O-U-R.
Definition
- 1A journey through a particular building, estate, country, etc.
- 2A guided visit to a particular place, or virtual place.
- 3A journey through a given list of places, such as by an entertainer performing concerts.
- 4A trip taken to another country in which several matches are played.
- 5A street and road race, frequently multiday.
- 6A set of competitions which make up a championship.
- 7A tour of duty.
- 8A closed trail.
- 9A going round; a circuit.
- 10A turn; a revolution.
- 11A circuit of snooker tournaments
Etymology
From Old French tour, tourn, from the verb torner, tourner.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: otur,toru,tourr,ttour,tuor
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of tour - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you spell "tour"?
What does "tour" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "tour"?
How do you pronounce "tour"?
What is the origin of the word "tour"?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Using “tour”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is T-O-U-R - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /tɔː(ɹ)/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “Tu” - see the side-by-side comparison. tour vs Tu
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.